1. Field of the Invention
The technical scope of the invention is that of standoff ballistic protection devices to protect doors, and in particular doors of military vehicles.
2. Description of the Related Art
To protect military vehicles from projectiles and explosive devices attacking by means of hollow charges or shaped charges, ballistic protections are installed at a distance from the external walls of the vehicle. These protections are often termed “slats” and consist in placing gridding, parallel bars, or simple louvered panels or even netting at a distance of between 200 and 400 mm around the vehicle and possibly above the vehicle. The aim of this protection is to perturb the triggering of projectiles before they reach the vehicle itself.
These protections are also placed in front of the doors and access hatches of the vehicle. With respect to the doors, it is obvious that the protection should not hinder the door's opening and closing to allow the crew to enter or exit the vehicle, but above all the door protection must be able to be installed or removed by the crew, without the need for assistance of a person outside the vehicle, for the crew to be able to enter or exit autonomously.
For this, it is known to fix a standoff ballistic protection panel that is fastened to the vehicle door so that the protection follows all the movements of the door. This solution presents the major disadvantage of requiring a non-protected zone around the door to enable its opening and closing movements. In other terms, this solution causes an absence of protection in proximity to the door hinges, this in order to be able to pivot the door without the protection fastened to the door interfering with the protection elements fastened to the vehicle and placed close by.
Patent EP1944566 discloses a standoff protection device surrounding a vehicle. This device incorporates hinges at the joining point of each panel that enable the protection panels to fold with respect to one another in a similar way to the bellows of an accordion. This way of folding the panels provides access to the vehicle's side doors from the exterior.
We see that this solution is not totally satisfactory since, from the inside of the vehicle, the crew is not able to open or close the panel placed facing the door.
A vehicle is also known (the Warthog) that is provided with protection covering the front doors and incorporating a panel hinged on hinges and driven by a connecting rod linked to the door. In this device the protective panel is not integral with the door and the level of protection provided is not sufficient.